Yesterday morning (Feb 19th), a meeting on Shale Gas at the Renaissance Hotel in Brussels, organised by Shale Gas Europe www.shalegas-europe.eu , was interrupted by a Greenpeace Invasion. The three young ladies in question, not surprisingly, didn’t offer any business cards, but before the meeting they had been handing out Greenpeace-branded literature at the door.

They forced their way to the front as my colleague Niki Tzavela (EFD, Greece) was speaking, and they donned hi-viz jackets and hard hats. Then they took various pieces of pipework from their bags and declared that they were going to start fracking right there in the hotel. On their backs they carried notices saying “WE WILL FRACK YOU”.

At first I wondered if this was a piece of street theatre organised by the sponsors, but judging by the bewildered looks of the chairman and speakers, I judged not. But I was surprised how little effort was made to stop the demonstration, as the audience shuffled its feet. So I got up and stated in robust — nay stentorian — tones that we were here to learn about fracking, and we didn’t want them wasting our time. Their spokesperson tried to respond, but soon realised that I had the louder voice, and that they would make no more progress.

At that, they whipped out a large anti-fracking banner and held it up (no doubt for the benefit of a co-conspirator with a camera). Stepping straight up to the front, I took hold of the banner, yanked firmly, and walked out of the room with it. And the miscreants packed up their impedimenta and followed meekly.

Greenpeace has history of direct action and disruption. So it was gratifying to have an opportunity to take a bit of direct action of my own, and to disrupt the Greenpeace initiative. And the show went on.

So, to the presentations. Philip Lowe, Commission Director-General for Energy, recognised that shale gas could reduce emissions (by comparison with coal); reduce imports of fossil fuels; and improve security of supply, while potentially contributing to EU competitiveness. The Commission had “done a lot of work” on shale gas, and was currently undertaking impact assessments. He was generally positive on shale: “We should not look a gift horse in the mouth”.

Niki Tzavela summarised her work as the parliament’s rapporteur on shale gas. She called for more transparency to allay public concerns, and felt that shale gas was a solution to some of the paradoxes of current energy policy in the EU — for example Germany relying on both renewables and coal, now that they are closing their nuclear capacity. She particularly mentioned the UK, pointing out that the UK was the cradle of the Industrial Revolution, and hoping that shale gas in the UK might be the birth of a European energy revolution (though she thought that the way things are going, Ukraine might get there before us). But she stressed that without shale gas, European businesses and consumers were facing energy poverty. www.affordable-energy-eu

Professor Richard Davies of Durham University has done extensive research on fracking, and the long-established US experience. He pointed out that coal mining, geothermal and hydro had caused more seismic events than fracking (ironical, since the Greens love geothermal and hydro). He has studied 192 cases of seismic activity associated with fracking — although of those only three were significant enough to achieve “felt sensitivity” on the surface — that is, to be detectable without instruments to people in the area. He referred also to “NORMs” (Naturally Occurring Radioactive Materials) which can be brought to the surface by fracking liquids, and observed that the amount of radioactivity involved was small compared to radioactive materials disposed of by the medical profession.

Professor Kristina Stoykova told us about gas prospecting in her native Bulgaria. Graeme Smith, VP Exploration & Unconventionals for Shell, summed up, observing that shale gas represented a “once in a generation” opportunity. It’s rather important that we should not miss it.

Late News: Greenpeace insist that the people who disrupted the shale gas meeting were not from them. They point the finger at Friends of the Earth.

Good for you.
To be fair to Greenpeace they are the only ecofascist organisation that refuse EU money to fund their lobbying for more EU control of everything, most of them get 70% of their cash from the EU and almost 100% when other governments are4 included. But that is no way justifies them using force to interupt a peaceful meetin

It is completely unfair and prejudicial to regard Greenpeace as “ecofascist”. If you can’t handle peaceful protest then it is you who are undemocratic. Greenpeace and other environmental organisations like Friends of the Earth are simply trying to draw attention to facts that are concevniently whiteawshed or denied by proponents of shale gas. Facts such as the many incidents of environmental harm suffered by people living near fracking operations in the USA, Canada and Australia. You really cannot be surprised by opposition to fracking when there is so much evidence of harm to the environment and to people’s health. And calling them “ecofascist” just means you are not even prepared to have an honest and democratic debate about fracking. Which is not surprising as you probably want to frack for shale gas anyway, whatever local communities think.

Thanks Andrew. I have no problem with peaceful protests, so long as they don’t unduly inconvenience others. But I do object to my working time being wasted by street theatre. You want to organise an anti-fracking event? Go for it. You’re welcome. Just don’t do it in the middle of someone else’s meeting.

The campaigners didn’t use any force at all. It was completely peaceful by all accounts. The only force used was by Roger who had to shout them down. From Roger’s own account, everyone else was pleased to sit there peacefully and seemed to enjoy events unfold.

And while our politicos disregard the fact that not too far in the future this country will be completely in the hands of our European partners and their [huh, some oxymoron that is ! our partners] clutches for all our power , they the politicos are letting our power station reach their viable end, while we sit on enough gas to make us independent of their money grabbing tentacles, I am begining to believe that we have nowt but the fith column in our government and opposition they seem intent on the destruction of our culture and country.

How can these chemicals be controlled once they are blasted through the ground? I have read articles from the USA where these chemicals are polluting the water table and livestock are becoming ill after ingesting polluted water and grass.

Jane, It was kind of you to recycle some Gazprom propaganda. You have to understand that the protagonists in this debate are not fair and unbiased. They all have axes to to grind. I too have an axe to grind. I want prosperity for my country and my constituents, and I believe that our UK natural gas reserves can help to achieve it.

And you are willing to sacrifice peoples’ lives for that prosperity, are you Roger? Have you heard what shale gas development is doing to communities in the States. If not, here’s a taster. And, no, it’s not fictional. Some of your fellow MEPs have had the chance to speak to these vicitms. http://pennsylvaniaallianceforcleanwaterandair.wordpress.com/the-list/ It’s pretty sad that any politician would go so far as to sacrifice the lives of his constituents for economic gain. You can expect to lose your seat in 2014, Roger. We’ll make full sure of that! 🙂

I think that Roger is actually sceptical (you really should stop using the term ‘deny’, which is a disgraceful slur) of CAGW rather than the miniscule amount of warming caused by AGW, as are most people who have looked at the evidence – or in the case of CAGW the complete lack of it.

Only those wedded to the cause of de-industrialisation, rent seekers and opportunists go along with the scam.

As I have repeatedly made clear, I have invested in a solar PV system for the subsidies, not to save the planet. The government offers me free money — I take it. In purely financial terms, it was about twice as good an investment as an annuity.

Dead right, Charles. I don’t accept anthropogenic global warming, and I believe that CO2 emissions do more good than harm — greening the planet and raising crop yields. But I understand that some people are still concerned about CO2 emissions, and therefore the dramatic reduction in US emissions as a result of the shale gas revolution is worth mentioning.

No Charles. You may not call me a climate change denier. I have said, and written, over and over again, that the climate constantly changes, and that anyone who denies that is an ignorant fool. The question is not whether the climate changes, but why. And as the changes over the last hundred years are precisely analogous to cyclical changes that have occurred repeatedly for thousands of years, it is very difficult to make the case that they are caused by human activity.

Well done Roger. Why is fracking a greater evil than those horrible sleep destroying windmills that don’t work anyway, or solar panels wasting prime agricultural land that we need to grow food? And as for CAGW, when any of those climate models based on that theory make a prediction that actually comes true, I might start to take it seriously, although I suppose by the law of averages they might get one right sometime. For now, CO2 emissions don’t matter, and premature closure of fossil fuel power stations is pissing away taxpayer’s hard earned money for no purpose. Lamposts and piano wire are too good for those crooks.

You are advocating the use of “lamposts and piano wire”? And your rabidly aggressive and inhuman comments gets through moderation on this blog? Clearly you have gone beyond the pale here as well as revealing your gross intolerance of any views that contradict your denial of the evidence for human-induced global warming.

Actually, if you read what I wrote I was NOT advocating lamp posts and piano wire, but soemthing unspecified and worse. We are talking about those who exploit the holy name of science as a means to extract taxes from the gullible (and the not so gullible who have no say) and push the poor into fuel poverty in the name of profit for themselves. It is always the same. Invent a scare, then exploit pthe fears you have generated to rip people off and increase political control over them. In case you are wondering, I have a good science degree and have had an amateur interest in weather and climate since childhhod (I run my own weather station even now). So I am not ingnorant of the science, I have studied it carefully and have found not convincing evidence of AGW (natural climate change certainly, but that’s a different thing that has always happened). When someone tells me what would have to happen to prove that theory false, I might take it more seriously. Everything is evidence in favour doesn’t work for me. A theory cannot stand unless there is some way of proving it false that we can show cannot and does not happen.

Really, Charles, you’re a bit of a flat-earther. First, there is no scientific consensus. On the contrary, there is a lively debate. How familiar are you with the negative logarithmic equation governing the greenhouse effect? Have you studied negative feed-backs associated with water-vapour and cloud formation? Are you familar with the relation between solar radiation, cosmic ray effects and the upper atmosphere? Do you know that climate is a complex and chaotic system — which is why the computer models designed to predict future climate fail so spectacularly? Where did you get your degree (mine was from Cambridge, by the way)?

The flat earther is back to you, Roger. You are only pretending that there would be a “lively debate” whether human activity is causing current rapid global warming or not. 97% of climate scientists agree on AGW. The vast majority of scientists in other fields agree on AGW. The majority of the people now believe what the scientists are telling them. It’s only a little minority you belong to who are willingly misinforming the people about anthropogenic global warming.

Mr Helmer, Indeed, this is a complex issue, but there is scientific consensus that human activity is causing global warming. As Charles has pointed out, 97% of the world’s leading climate scientists are in agreement.

Its no good blinding me with science, I haven’t been to uni nor have a degree. so if you can explain something to me without using emotive language and sounding like someone who is from Dad’s Army 2 “We are all doomed” I have listened to all the fear factor declarations of climate change etc etc . I have yet to hear from what I consider is a control by fear factor exponant of the dire meaning of climate change by stifling debate by name calling, of how we are to heat our homes in the very near future? wind farms are a cash cow for many, as are solar panels, both are inefficient , that is fact I have a friend in Wales whose scenic value to life has been destroyed by monsters that have to be turned off when the wind becomes too strong. Europe is closing our Gas stations, I know we old people are considered past our sell by date ,so disregard the people who die in their homes of the cold , how do you intend to keep essential places like hospitals / cremetoriums [there wont be the gas to burn the bodies] schools /transport, in fact all essential services working , please give me a solution to what we are no doubt heading
for?
When I went to school we had a lesson called geography which included how the earth evolved through climate change, in the fifties we were warned of in impending ice age ,I really am prepared to listen to what your solution is apart from the two I have mentioned.

That “97% of climate scientists” malarky has been debunked so many times you should be embarrassed to even mention it.

What “…current rapid global warming…” are you referring to? There hasn’t been any for 16 years – a fact admitted even by the President of the IPCC.

It’s not possible to deny a consensus, ‘consensus’ is a political term and nothing to do with science. Are you familiar with the scientific method? I very much doubt it or you wouldn’t keep repeating ridiculous logical fallacies like ‘argumentum ad populum’ (consensus), ‘argumentum ad hominem’ (name calling) and ‘argumentum ad vericundium’ (appeal to authority).

I already posted proof for the scientific consensus on climate change. Nothing “debunked” there. Just open the links. When I’m talking about current rapid global warming I’m talking about the last 100 years or so. In geological terms that’s a very short period of time in which we have warmed the planet by about 1° C.

Thank you mrsircharles, I read the link you posted. The retrieval of the chemicals is unregulated and still a hit and miss process. This is a disaster waiting to happen, all very well for you to say Roger that you believe the chemicals are recycled when clearly it’s not a finite process. We should all be wary of the consequences of fracking, once the water table is polluted it could take decades to rectify.

“The frenzy to power continued economic and population growth means drilling and fracking for oil and gas is no longer “out of sight, out of mind.” Energy companies want to drill in urban areas of Colorado. Citizens from these communities took the “Bring Your Own Gas Mask” tour of a rural area in Garfield County – to see what life in the oil patch will be like.

I don’t know what your opinion on the holocaust is, but there is megatons of scientific evidence for AGW. If you believe that science websites like SkepticalScience.com or RealClimate.com are “alarmist sites” so be it. I’m not trying to teach an ignoramus like you the simple facts of physics. The reader may decide her/himself. But one is for sure: The only climate change controversy is political, not scientific. My “vested interest” are our children and grandchildren. It’s more the question what vested interests you climate change deniers have.

the conclusive piece of evidence for human-induced global warming: the volume of Arctic summer sea ice has declined by 70% over the last 30 years (see: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/aug/11/arctic-sea-ice-vanishing), and scientists predict that the Arctic will be completely ice-free in summer sometime between 2015 and 2020. That has never happened before in all human history, and has only happened during a period of extremely rapid increase in carbon emissions from industrial processes over the last 150 years.

You seem to be trying to disrupt the thread of this discussion by throwing things in out of time sequence, making the thread difficult to follow.

Let me discuss some of the points you make.

1. There has been a Hundred years of global warming as you state. We have been recovering from a solar Grand Minimum, which brought a period of cold weather of around 30 years, ending in the 1830’s.

The AGW theory does not recognise any man made carbon dioxide contribution before the late 1970’s. In fact many of the climate scientists backing AGW theory were warning of a coming ice age during the 1970’s.

2. 97% of scientists agree that carbon dioxide is a green house gas and contributes to global warming.

The answer to that question must be yes. The argument is about the degree. The IPCC theory states that the very small amount of extra warming caused by man made CO2 will cause a positive feed back and hence a catastrophic increase in temperature. A sign of the feedback effect will show itself with a Hot Spot in the stratosphere above the equator. Many thousand of Radiosonde balloons have been looking for the hot spot for 30 years. It is not there yet.

The reason that we do not here or read much about alternative theories is the bullying of people who disagree with AGW theory (Look at the climate gate emails) and the out and out bias of the BBC.

3. There is rapid global warming taking place.

No there is not. Temperatures have declined slightly over the last 16 years and even the Met Office do not see any rise in temperature for the next five years.

My advice to you Sir is to take note of sunspot activity. The 11 year sunspot cycle should peak this year, unfortunately this cycle has hardly risen from the minimum of 2008. This does not give any confidence in the next eleven year cycle rising to normal levels. It is probable that we will see a return to the little ice age conditions for the next 20 years at least.

Climate looks as though it is going to change, but not in the direction that you think.

1) I suppose you made a typo there when talking about the 1830s. Also: “AGW theory does not recognise any man made carbon dioxide contribution before the late 1970′s”. I can’t find any evidence for that claim. So your first point doesn’t make any sense at all for me.

Thank you John now that I understood , I have stopped reading some posts as to me when it is taken to a level of personal insult the argument is lost. however you have for my simplistic mind answered the questions posed in detail. thank you at least I have more understanding now.

Too right. So many AGW proponents resort to tghe techniques or propaganda rather than discussing the actual science with the actual data and methodologies used to come to thier conclusions.
As for Arctic ice, where may well be other mechanisms, and its a local effect anyway since Antactic ice is increasinf, and globally that equates to a slight increase. It has been suggested that the cuase of Arctic ice decrease is indeed man’s activities, but is soot caused by induxtrial activity in the N Hemisphere rather than CO2.
The majot greenhouse cas in the atmosphere is of course water vapour, not CO2. Water vapour is three times as powerful in its greenhouse effect as CO2, and has a variable concentration in the atmosphere of up to 4%, or 40,000 parts per million. CO2 at less than 400ppm has a minisuce effect in comparison, is limited to a marrow band of frequencies of radiation, nealy all of which is already absorbed by existing amounts of CO2. There is therefore a limit that has almost been reached of how much warming CO2 can cause, after which further increases in CO2 will have no effect. The fallacy is in considering CO2 derived greehouse effect to be linear when it isn’t. But even if it is, total CO2 greenhouse effect is as I show above only a third of 1% of the total greenhouise effect. This has been estinated at about 33 degrees C, so the total effect of atmospheric CO2 is therefore about 0.1 degress C.
That’s total CO2 of course. Mankinds emissions are perhaps a sixth of that if you are generous. So from that i make the total contribuation of CO2 to global warming as aroubnd 2 hundredths of a degree C. This is too small to detect in climate records of course.
AGW proponentsd therefore have to invent a number of very dubious positive feedback mechanisms to give credence to thier scare stories. Of course, as any engineer can tell you, positive feedback on that scale would have resulted in either climate instability and runway warming or cooling a long time ago had such a mechanism been present. So it clearly isn’t.
The only thing that the climate models have succeeded in proving so far is that we don’t understand climate change well enough to make predictions. That shouldn’t stop us trying and learning from the process, but we should certainly not commit billions of taxpayers and other money on the assumption that the predictions of those flawed modesl are correct.

It doesn’t wonder me that you cannot cite a single scientific source for all your claims. It would go beyond the scope of this thread to look behind all your false assertions. If you want more discussion we can meet at the climate change debate.

Just briefly:

Increasing water vapour and shrinking albedo are positive feedbacks of AGW. The trigger of modern global warming is the rise in atmospheric CO2. That’s acknowledged by 97% of world’s climate scientists.

You are calling mainstream science a “flaw”. That should explain enough for the reader here.

The U.S. National Academy of Science have produced a series of videos providing a basic overview of climate science – the series is called Climate Change: Lines of Evidence.

Since i am a scientist myself, i don’t need your appeals to authority. I look at the raw data and draw my own conclusions. That is the only logical way a scientist can work. Some of the raw data and methods of processing have been supressed by the AGW “scientific” establishment which makes it rather hard to replicate their work (I wonder why) but the rest is readily accessible on the internet. Temperature records in the UK for over 400 years for example, not just since 1970 as beloved by the AGW folk. Or the dubious techniqus of comparing satellite measurements with terrestrial ones. We still have terrestrial records of course, but they take longer to correlate and provcess than the satellite ones. By the time they are available, the headlines have been grabbed.
Or the so-called “adjuctements” that have been made to some of the records, always in the direction of reducing earlier temperatures and increasing later ones. Often the adjustments are greater than the signal we are trying to identify. Then you wonder why I and many others are sceptical.
The corrections, if anything should be in the opposite sense to correct for increasing urbanisation, something that the AGW establishment prefer to ignore as “negligible”. But it isn’t, my own local readings verify that. My suburban location often had temperature minima a couple of degrees above rural locations. Averaged over the year, that would account for most of the claimed warming trend.
But don’t get me wrong. cimate change DOES happen. If it didn’t it would be the first time ever. It is nothing to be afraid of. I know AGW apologists like to confuse the fact that no same person would dispute that (is that where the 97% figure comes from) with the real argument about what is causing climate change. I don’t deny climate change, I only have severe reservations about human CO2 emissions being a significant cause of it. That’s not the same thing, but many AGW activists like to pretend that it is.
So climate change happens. Period. we should be aware of that. But a multi-billion pound attempt to prevent it by limiting CO2 emissions is futile, it won’t prevent something that has always happened. We should simply do what we have always done, and be prepared to adapt to whatever happens, since we have no track record of succesfully predicting it. And as a taxpayer and fuel user I want my money back. Those who are proposing and benfitting from this scam should morally be expected to repay the cost of it. Of course they never will, so lets just stop pouring more good money down this black hole. it will achieve nothing.

I am an applied scientist, and engineer working on the development of safety related systems in the aviation industry. This is why I need solid proof and exhaustive tesing of hypotheses. If it’s wrong, people die. Concentrates the mind a bit that!

I’m afraid you can’t. As a salaried worker my work obviously belongs to my employer, and most is company confidential. Sometimes documents of mine have been shared with customers and sometimes written for specific customers. Docments that the company publishes in journals are written by our professional technical writers.

That is a very narrow definition of a RESEARCH scientist. Applied scientists use the results of research to develop things which are actually useful to mankind. So we have to understand the issues, as well as being able to innovate. And if it doesn’t work, we don’t get paid, or even worse, might even get sued or harm someone. So climatologists can be considered as theoretical scientists. The Applied scientists in metoerologigy are the weather forecasters. They are the ones that are expected to get it right. And they need just as much knowledge of the physics of the atmosphere as the climatologists,
Here is an article by a weather forcaster, which contains an interesting look at what is actually happenning in the real world. http://patriotpost.us/opinion/16982

Well, according to your definition I’m a scientist too, Martin. Now, the “real” world… explained in an article “The Difference Between Climate and Weather” at The Patriot Post … The problem is that weatherman Joe Bastardi doesn’t really tell us the difference between climate and weather, but therefore abuses the headline to give us some more misinformation. I’m not going into details now about the “ice recovery” myth and others. Joe Bastardi has been debunked too many times. Here some quotes => http://www.skepticalscience.com/skeptic_Joe_Bastardi.htm

Real patriots want to preserve the climate and don’t do lip-service for a small group of climate change deniers (see “Climate Change Denial”) with very unpatriotic interests!

You are a scientist too! Good or yer. Perhaps you could explain where the correlation is between the graphs in Mr Bastardi’s article (he is a scientist too you know) and why the IPCC has failed dismally to predict climate change. But then, perhaps that what you’d expect of an organisation that publishes its “Summary for Policymakers” before the research on which it is purported to be based has been completed. I think those graphs demonstrate quite clearly that the predictions of the climate models have failed . Also, I think Mr Bastardi does demonstrate the difference between climate and weather. Of course warmists like to confuse the issue, so that they can blame weather eventsd like Sandy on “climate change” even though similar events have happened many times before.

Nothing to confuse, Martin. It’s the “16 years no warming” crowd who are taking weather for climate. The evidence is there. And it’s overwhelming. The U.S. National Academy of Science have produced a series of videos providing a basic overview of climate science – the series is called Climate Change: Lines of Evidence.

If you don’t trust the U.S. National Academy of Science, whom else would you trust?

I don’t trust anybody who refuses to publish his souce data and methodology, especially when their conclusuion is at variance with actual observations and what can be deduced from the data and methods we know about. Ther CO2 theory of Global Warming was based on a 17 year period of warming. Are you saying that a 17 year trend is climate but a 16 year one isn’t? Before that there was a period of cooling which led to the alarmists of the time predicting a new ice age!
The assumption is always that trends will continue. Fortunately they never have. Now we have some warmists saying that nature has got it wrong, it is warming really although we can’t measure it. That is religious faith, not science!

1. I disagree. the detailed maethodologies have never been available and have been agressively hidden by the scientists concerned who have stated as their reason that”that would only allow sceptics to try to discredit our work”. Why are they so worried if they are so confident in the validity of their work. Steve Mcintyre and others have had to struggle very hard to try to get hold of the data and methods used to construct Mann’s “HockeyStick” for example, and when they did they discovered that ANY source date would produce a hockey stick when that mwethosd was used.

4. There had been no statistically significant warming since 1998. Even the UK Met Office, wedded to the warmist myth as it is, has finally had to admit that. If anything, we have experienced slight cooling which now appears to be accelerating.

We have been recovering from the Dalton sunspot grand minimum. This began around 1790 and lasted until around 1830. Since 1830 the basic trend in temperature has been upwards, modified by the ocean oscillations, PDO, AMO, ENSO, etc. We now have a problem, as it seems that sunspot cycle 24 (SC24) should have reached its maximum intensity this year 2013. It has however stayed at the minimum levels, normally at this stage in the 11 year cycle sunspot activity should be five or six times higher. The last time this happened was during SC5, which started around 1790. Some scientists think that we may be at the start of another 40 years of cold winters and wet summers, others think that the sunspot minimum will only last two cycles (around 22 years).

Science theory is only proved by experiment and observation. It only takes one experiment or observation to change the course of science. The scientists who hold different theories to the majority and are suffering ridicule and abuse are in good company, Galileo and Einstein come to mind.

You mentioned Michael Mann’s hockey stick in one of your previous posts here. There is certainly much evidence that the Medieval warm period existed. The Vikings colonised Greenland, but had to abandon the settlements as the climate cooled from around 1300. The Roman warm period probably also existed, as grapes were grown as far North as York in the UK. Today they can only be grown commercially in southern England and the last couple of years even there it has been difficult.

Humans are emitting 130 times more CO2 than all volcanoes on our planet, evety year. The atmospheric CO2 concentration has raised by 40% over the last century. The greenhouse gas effect has been understood for ~150 years now. The last time CO2 concentrations were that high is millions of years ago when out planet was much hotter. So it only takes a bit of common sense to understand what scientists are telling us: the earth may warm by 2 to 8° C by the end of this century. We can already see a drastic increase in extreme weather events. Farming in large areas of this planet is in jeopardy. Floods, droughts and hurricanes are becoming increasingly more often. If wee keep on burning all that bound carbon and releasing it into our atmosphere global warming will put our climate into catastrophic order.

Shale gas extraction is not only poisoning ground and surface waters. It is counter productive when it comes to combat manmade global warming. => Fracking methane

Shale gas is not a “bridging fuel”, it is a delaying fuel, delaying the inevitable transformation of our energy supplies towards a carbon free production.

So what? I have shown above that the effect of CO2 on climate is miniscule. It is actually useful in promoting plant growth and helping us to grow more food.
Mrsircharles you state the gloval warming mantra without any attempt at proof. You use the propaganda techniques of appeal to authority without demonstrating that you have any understanding of the science at all. I see no actual science and no maths. That makes your comments worthless.
Can someone refute my argument that the effect of CO2 emissions on climate is so small that it cannot be measured? If you can’t you have no right to exprerss an opinion on the subject.
But its par for the course, AGW activists never discuss the science. For one thing they know they would lose, and for another their beleifs are more akin to religous faith than science. But they dress them up as sicence, then can’t produce the science to support their beleifs.

“NASA scientists report that warmer temperatures and changes in precipitation locally and regionally have altered the growth of large forest areas in the eastern United States over the past 10 years. Using NASA’s Terra satellite, scientists examined the relationship between natural plant growth trends, as monitored by NASA satellite images, and variations in climate over the eastern United States from 2000 to 2010.”

Mrsircharles you have posted no [proof whatsoever of anything. All it is is an appeal to authority. And that authority is disputed by other authorities. Do you not have the wit to form your own opinions? I could equally point to many other authorities that disagree with the ones that you have quoted, so at the very least if you are even handed, you have to admit to the presence of some doubt. Like all good lies, the CO2 theory of climate change is based on some truth. But it is all about how much effect it has, and my contention is that the effect of CO2 has been overplayed by at least two orders of magnitude. Neither you nor any of your references address this.
Note that this is an argument about the science, not about voting which is a political construct. You can’t vote about science, it is either right or wrong. It’s a bit unforgiving that way. It is about searching for truth, not appealing for votes. If it is right then it can be repeatedly and robstly proven, and attempts to disprove it are both clearly specified and shown repeatedly to fail. That has never been the case with the AGW hypothesis, so it remains hypotheical. Remeber, correlation, even if correlation can be shown to exist in this case which is extremely questionable, does not demonstrate ot prove causation.
In order to deserve credence, an hypothesis must be shown to predict future events. If i repeat the experiment in controlled conditions, things behave the way the hypothesis predics. This has never been achieved with AGW. Currently antractic ice is at a record high. So Artic melting is not global. And that is typical of the selective way that so-called AGW evidence is gathered, ignoring anything that is contrary. That is quite simply not the way that science works, you need to explain why Antactic ice is increasing, as well as why Arctic ice has decreased. You need to explain why the northern Hemisphere is suffering its fifth below average temperature winter in a row, despite thios so-called warming.
Phil Jones is on record as saying he couldn’t explain the lack of warming. Well i can, it is quite simple. His models are wrong. Pretty obvious i would have thought.

Actually I don’t need to prove anything, since I’m not the one proposing a controversial hypothesis. AGW baased modelling has failed to predict the current lack of warming. We have just had five below overage winters in a row. Antarctic ice is increasing year on year. Arctic ice has recovered from last summer’s minimum at the fastest rate ever recorded. Yesterday, a new record low temperature for the N Hemisphere was recorded in Siberia,
You can do what you like with computer models, but the one thing that doesn’t lie is real world measurements. These measurements are not showing warming, and haven’t for some years now, in fact the stasis has lasted almost as long as the preceding warming phase. These are actual measurements, not computer generated predictions. In the continental US, it has recently been shown that the warmest decade on record was the 1930s.
It takes a head very deep in the sand i think to look at these things and not begin to doubt AGW hypothesis.
It is true that there is no actual solid proof of this hypothesis of course. Even if we could upgrade it to a theory (we can’t) there would still be no proof. If there was actual proof it would be called a law, So it is clear that any claims of proof are false.

“And that authority is disputed by other authorities.” Well, of course it is disputed by other bodies, but if you look closely the facts are most often disputed by vested interests. I suggest you read the excellent book by Naomi Oreskes ‘Merchants of Doubt’ which offers a good insight into how vested interests have merchandised doubt in the climate change debate so as to suit their own agenda.

Not only that. “Scientist” Martin is trying to propose a controversial hypothesis himself. It’s him who is is neglecting the scientific consensus on AGW. As a “scientist” he’s delivering no evidence whatsoever for his theories.

That’s the claim that is often made, whilst ignoring the vested intetrests that subsudise the AGW scam. Al Gore and his mates have become righ on it. Many scientists research grants depend in this scare, so of course they try to perpetuate it in the face on contrary evidence which is simply ignored. Do you find it suspicious that these “scientists” often refuse to publish their source data ot methodologies, which of course prevents others from verifying them? What are they afraid of? If they are so sure of their ground, surely they would be happy for their work to be subjected to any test, knowing those test would only strengthem their case.
The subsuidies paid to the AGW industry by governments and others are estimated as at least 10 times what goes into anti-AGW by all these so-called “vested interests” combined.

Charles,
In any opinion poll the answer is conditioned by the question. The question posed by your 97% poll was:- Is CO2 a greenhouse gas and is it contributing to global warming. The answer is yes. The question did not ask for any qualification of the degree to which CO2 affects climate.

I agree that the overall spectral output of the sun has not changed significantly over hundreds of years, however there has been a significant change in the last five years in the extreme ultra violate (EUV) output of the sun. EUV seems to follow the sunspot level and has reduced significantly. The theory goes that EUV drives ozone production. Lack of ozone affects the Arctic Oscillation (AO) air pressure bands, which when reversed during winter blocks warm air from the Atlantic and Pacific to the Northern hemisphere land masses. On a day to day basis blocking seems to cause a distortion in the Jet stream, with parts looping up to the arctic and sending part much further south, bringing cold air over Europe and North America. The UK has been in the grip of this for the last week and looks like it will continue for some days yet. A similar effect is felt in the southern hemisphere winter.

There is another theory advanced by Svenmark:- the solar wind effect. More solar wind shields the earth from cosmic radiation. At present solar wind is low due to lack of sunspots and other magnetic effects, allowing more cosmic radiation to hit the earth. The theory says that cosmic particles cause more clouds to form reducing the amount of the sun’s energy reaching the surface. There was some interesting research done last year at CERN. We therefore have colder winters and wetter summers.

In summary, studies have shown that GCRs exert a minor influence over low-level cloud cover, solar magnetic field has not increased in recent decades, nor has GCR flux on Earth decreased. In fact, if GCRs did have a significant impact on global temperatures, they would have had a net cooling effect over the past 50 years, especially over the past 50 years when global warming was strongest.”

Unconventional gas drilling is emerging as one of the most controversial energy & environmental issues in the United States and around the world today.

Advancements in extraction technologies, particularly horizontal drilling and high volume hydraulic fracturing (fracking), have enabled drillers to reach previously inaccessible gas in geological formations underlying several areas of the U.S.

Increasing public awareness of the threats posed by America’s dependence on foreign oil and dirty coal to public health and the global climate have led many – including some environmental organizations and progressive politicians – to embrace gas as a ‘bridge fuel’ to help America kick its dirty energy addiction.

But recent revelations about the dangers that unconventional gas drilling poses to drinking water supplies, public health and the global climate are raising important questions about how “clean” this gas really is.

Scientists studying the impacts of unconventional gas drilling warn that gas is likely to have a greater influence on water, air and climate than previously understood. Major scientific bodies have cautioned against a national commitment to gas as a bridge fuel, citing the need for further research into the potential consequences of continued reliance on this fossil fuel.

A growing number of land owners, former gas industry executives and elected officials are also challenging the notion that gas is as clean as its proponents argue, and questioning whether unconventional gas drilling can be done without threatening drinking water supplies, air quality and the global climate.

Yet the gas industry continues to benefit from lax oversight and several exemptions from existing public health protections, such as the Safe Drinking Water Act and parts of the Clean Water Act that apply to other fossil fuel extraction industries. Recent attempts by federal agencies and lawmakers to improve oversight of gas operations have been met with strong resistance from the gas industry and its alliance of front groups and defenders in the media.

The gas industry’s influence in Washington has grown tremendously thanks, in large part, to the rapid consolidation of the gas industry into the hands of the largest oil companies in the past few years. Not long ago, the industry was made up primarily of what its proponents call “mom and pop” companies—small operators that drilled chiefly for conventional gas.

But with recoverable deposits of that relatively ‘easy’ conventional gas dwindling in the Lower 48, larger drillers have turned their focus to the more difficult and expensive unconventional gas plays.

Oil giants such as BP, ExxonMobil, Shell and Chevron now dominate the gas industry. The industry’s chief front group, Energy In Depth (EID), goes to great lengths to maintain the “mom and pop” image of the industry, claiming it represents small and independent gas producers.

However, its own documents prove that its early funding – and ongoing financial support – comes from many of the largest oil and gas interests.

EID and other gas lobby groups argue that federal oversight and increased scrutiny and accountability measures would harm the industry’s development and risk jobs. But big oil companies have made that same “economy-killing” argument for decades – a strategy they learned from tobacco companies and the chemical industry – while amassing record profits and enjoying spectacular growth.

Through intensive lobbying, campaign contributions and other forms of influence, these oil and gas companies have successfully thwarted efforts to hold the gas industry accountable for its impacts on health and the environment.

Now the same companies that brought us the Exxon Valdez spill, the BP blowout in the Gulf of Mexico, Chevron’s destruction of the Amazonian rainforest in Ecuador and countless other pollution examples, want the public to blindly trust them – with zero federal oversight – as they pursue drilling for much riskier unconventional gas throughout the country.

The question is, given the oil industry’s track record of environmental and health disasters, can the public trust them to get it right with the more challenging unconventional gas?

This report is designed to shed light on the rapidly changing composition of the gas industry and to raise important questions about whether the rush to exploit unconventional gas may be coming at too high a cost to the environment.

While coal and oil certainly pose their own significant challenges to health and climate, it is important to recognize that unconventional gas is also a dirty fossil fuel and does not belong in any credible definition of ‘clean energy’.

Given the extensive uncertainties surrounding the impacts potentially connected to the unconventional gas industry’s current drilling practices, it is only prudent at this point to insist on a pause for further evaluation. In fact, as a direct result of the recent Chesapeake gas well blowout in Pennsylvania that spilled drilling chemicals onto nearby properties and waterways, a former gas company executive called for a moratorium on all fracking operations near waterways in Arkansas’s Fayetteville shale region, stating that:

‘There is no reason on Earth, if they are going to close it down there, they shouldn’t close it down here.’

It is becoming increasingly clear that the unconventional gas boom is happening too fast, too recklessly and with insufficient concern for the potential cumulative impacts on our most critical resources – clean air, safe drinking water and a stable climate.

DeSmogBlog joins those who are calling for a nationwide moratorium on hydraulic fracturing and other troublesome practices in the unconventional gas industry. Until independent scientists and experts conduct further studies, the public simply cannot trust the fossil fuel industry to continue with this dirty energy boom.”

ALARP , NORMS, all such reasuring terminology. As someone living in an area of Ireland with the highest incidence of radon gas in europe, where the shale is shallow, and lies on top of an aquifer of regional importance, our terminology uses the phrase precautionary principle must apply. Stats from the marcellus or fayetteville do not apply to the bundoran shale, we have a plethora of turbines, we dont mind lots more, stop the headlong rush into quite possible irreversible damage to the water table, communities, reversal of growth trends in agriculture and tourism, if it is a safe option, wait twenty years to develop well casings that dont leak, chemical free drilling operations, and use the health stats pouring in from canada australia and the us to ascertain wheyther or not gas at any cost is worth the potential and real health risk that such intensive, invasive and destructive industrialization of rural areas will bring.